


With No Intent

by orphan_account



Series: A Question of Intent [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: AUTHOR AU, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Author!Marco, Gardener-slash-landscaper!Jean, M/M, There may or may not be a lot of secondhand embarrassment
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-01-29
Updated: 2014-04-18
Packaged: 2018-01-10 11:07:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1158972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean Kirstein is a gardener-slash-landscaper with almost nothing to do except constantly change his own garden when not working. After witnessing a particularly odd exchange between his neighbor and some delivery kid, he notices his neighbor is beginning to spend a lot of time sitting on his porch, doing whatever it is he does on his laptop all the time. But when he realizes that at least 25% of that time, if not more, is spent staring at him, Jean wants to know more. All he had wanted was to spend time peacefully in his garden…</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Might Be a Stalker

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean finds out he’s being watched and his neighbor might be a creeper.

The sound of loud knocking brought me out of my thoughts, disrupting the peace I had spent all morning trying to build up. When I sat back on my haunches and looked around, I noticed a delivery truck in front of my neighbor’s house and a lanky kid in the company’s uniform standing at his door. I muttered something about “fucking delivery kids” before leaning back over what I had been working on.

Okay, so I probably should have had some way to block out noise, especially considering my place was on a street with kids and it was a Saturday, but that just goes to show how good I was at planning things.

I pulled the bucket of manure closer to me and began carefully spreading it again, making sure my forget-me-nots would have plenty of nutrients. They were only buds so far, but come spring and they would be blooming into beautiful, tiny blue flowers. And I would make damn sure they made it that far along.

I heard a loud voice come from my neighbor’s house again, but this time I didn’t look up. It wasn’t until I heard footsteps that I sat back again. The delivery kid was _frolicking away from that dude’s house._ I couldn’t even say “skipping” because that word’s meaning wasn’t anywhere near what this kid’s movements were like. Number one: _what exactly_ could make someone that happy? And number two: who _frolics_ anymore? The biggest grin I had ever seen on someone his age was splitting his face, even as he got back into his delivery truck to continue on his rounds.

My face contorted in confusion as I looked back at my neighbor, who had stepped onto his porch to watch the kid leave. He was smiling, too. When he looked at me, he just shifted his package under his arm and shrugged. I rolled my eyes and went back to my forget-me-nots. I heard his front door shut, but then it was silent. Considering it was a Saturday, it was a nice surprise.

After I rinsed the manure off my hands with the garden hose, I spent a good amount of time babying my plants, spraying them with a little water. I refilled the aqua globe things I had in the soil of the plants on the porch, and then spent a long time changing the pattern in the rock garden I had arranged around the base of a tree. It was relaxing, changing those patterns. There were some times that I was extremely glad I had put one in.

When I finally finished changing the pattern, someone pulled up to my always-weirdly-happy neighbor’s house in a red pickup truck. At first, I couldn’t tell who it was, but when they got out and I got a glimpse of their face, I realized it was the delivery kid from earlier. He had changed into normal clothes and was holding two books as he walked up to my neighbor’s house. This time, he seemed nervous, and didn’t knock right away. I felt my face screw up in confusion again, but I didn’t dwell on it. Once he knocked and my neighbor had invited him inside, I went back to my garden.

_Why would he be coming back? This is really weird. Y’know what, I’m not even going to question it. If he’s really that happy about seeing some guy who never comes out of his house, then more power to him, I guess._

I went back to checking on my plants and, deciding that despite it being January, it was supposed to only get warmer from here on and that I should begin pruning my roses. Once I had grabbed my pruning shears, I set to work. There were three shrubs I would have to work on, and I had to be careful not to cut off any of the new buds or I could lose them when spring came. I dragged a small plastic bin over to the shrubs and began trimming, dumping the trimmings into the bin.

The delivery kid left about five minutes or so after he arrived. He left my neighbor’s house smiling wider than I had seen any other kid his age smile, yet again. _Does that guy deal in freaking happy pills or something?_ I couldn’t help but wonder, especially since he always seemed happy and his visitors always left happy. It was weird.

Even so, I wondered what it was like to be happy all the time. There were significant few times I had been truly happy, as happy as that guy made that kid look. The rest of the time I was at least slightly annoyed. Not to mention that I always looked pissed off. It was just the way my face settled. I was pretty sure I got on people’s nerves because of that, but there were few things that truly made me happy.

Not that it was impossible for me to be happy.

I just… Wasn’t.

When I was just about to begin pruning the last bush, I heard my neighbor’s front door open and close. I checked how close the shadow of my house had reached to me and realized it had grown a lot closer than I had expected it to. A lot of time had passed while I was pruning. I looked into the bin, noting that it was about half full with trimmings.

About half an hour passed while I finished pruning the last bush. It didn’t have as much that had needed to be trimmed off. I put the shears back in the box I stored my tools in and dumped the trimmings into the big trash can I kept in the back before deciding I should check on the community garden out in the park. If it wasn’t for me, most of it would likely be dead. Some people didn’t care at all, and others only cared about certain plants.

I began the walk to the park, going slowly as I did. I liked to look at the different ways people did their yards. There were a few people really into gardening, and I happened to know most of them. Those people had been my customers at one point. I was a landscaper by profession, and people usually seemed to like what I did, but mostly with those people I just helped them decide on what plants should go where and what decorations would fit with what they wanted. There were some others with simpler yards who had also been my customers once, but they let me do all of the work. The planning, the deciding, the digging and planting… Usually they only requested certain colors or something like that.

As I walked down the path from the road into the park, I noticed my neighbor sitting on a bench. He didn’t seem to notice me, and I didn’t want to seem weird just randomly walking up out of nowhere and being all, “Hey, how’s it going, I’m your neighbor Jean, nice to meet you.” I turned my attention away and began heading toward the garden, picking up a small watering can as I passed through the gate.

This time, it seemed like someone else had beaten me to the punch. Most of the plants looked like they had been recently watered. I put down the watering can and instead just wandered, reading the name plates of the ones I didn’t recognize and occasionally stopping to smell them.

The entire time, I felt eyes on me, but I didn’t want to even try looking for whoever was watching me. It was a huge-ass park.

A little while later, I left, heading back the same way I had come. I shoved my hands in the pockets of my pants, balling them into fists. It was a weird feeling, feeling like you were being watched.

When I got back to my place, I felt instantly calm as soon as I walked through the gate. I inhaled, taking in the faint scent of flowers that always surrounded the property. It was my own tiny little paradise.

Now, the reason why I loved flowers – plants in general, really – so much was partly due to my childhood. I hadn’t really ever gotten close to a whole lot of people, and while I cared about my parents, I didn’t really like spending a whole lot of time with them. It was hard for me to get along with people. So, I began spending whatever pocket money I could scrounge up on small plants and those setups home improvement stores had for kids – the ones that had dehydrated soil in little discs with the seeds packaged inside. Hell, I even took empty food cans and grew small plants in those. It was like a little tiny forest on my windowsill. Some people thought it was kind of weird, such an angry kid always out buying flowers and whatnot, but being around plants calmed me.

I probably sound like a pansy or something right now.

No pun intended.

But honest to God, I loved caring for plants. Maybe it was because I was responsible for such tiny lives, maybe it was just something I used to take my mind off other stuff. I wasn’t sure which one it was, but either way, it developed into something short of a passion, pretty much. I mean, it wasn’t just by coincidence that I became a landscaper and then found out I liked plants. I decided to be a landscaper because I liked plants and I liked arranging them. That was about it.

I lay down in the grass and crossed my arms behind my head, inspecting the leaves of the tree hanging over me as they obstructed the view of the clouds. I wasn’t sure how long I lay there, but after a while my neighbor went back inside his house. He came back outside again after what I assumed to be a few minutes, and I heard the startup music of a laptop. A short while later, I began to hear furious typing.

That had me curious, but not enough to make me want to go over and find out exactly what he was doing. He left me to my peace, so I would leave him to his. Eventually, I sat up and moved over to the bushes on my side of the fence separating our houses. Purely for something to do that required me to stay outside, I began pawing through the dirt and pulling leaves from underneath the bushes, piling them next to me. After a long time of doing this, the typing sounds stopped, and I heard my neighbor open and shut his front door again. Right at this time, I discovered a small bird’s nest in my bush.

I carefully retracted my hand and stood, putting my hands on my hips. I ignored the fact that I was probably getting dirt all over my clothes. The birds’ nest was new to me. I smiled, glad that my paradise meant something to another life, even if it was just a pair of birds. But a nest meant new lives would be coming along eventually.

As I was thinking about all this, my neighbor came back out. I didn’t notice right away, but what caught my attention was the feeling of being watched again. The smile fell from my face, and I looked up to find him staring directly at me, right out in the open. The guy jumped, looking sheepish.  I wiped the back of my hand across my forehead, narrowing my eyes as I inspected him.

The guy had somewhat tan skin, and he was _covered_ in freckles. They were everywhere. On his face, his neck, his ears, the backs of his hands. _Everywhere._ I couldn’t see if they were anywhere else, because he had on a pair of jeans and some gray sneakers, and he was wearing a hoodie over a t-shirt with a picture of one of the monsters from some popular book on it. His hair was black, cut in something similar to an undercut. His bangs parted at his forehead, but the rest just kind of fell wherever it seemed to think was fine.

He raised his hand and waved awkwardly, but when I didn’t do anything in response, he let his hand drop. We just stared at each other for a few moments more before he raised his hand again. He wiped his hand against his forehead, even though he had nothing there. My eyebrows, previously knit together, came apart, and I blinked. He ran away before I could do anything, though. I reached up and rubbed at my forehead with the back of my arm, and it came away with a thin coating of dirt on it. I looked at it for a moment before brushing it away.

_T_ _hat guy sure is strange… What the hell was he looking at, anyways? It’s not like I’m interesting to look at or something. If there was anything interesting to look at out here, it’d be my garden, not me._

I watched him scurry away, headed toward town. I shrugged and turned back to my house, heading inside to shower before I had some of the pomegranate I had split earlier with some leftover pasta from some restaurant. After eating, I stripped down to my boxers and went to bed, exhausted.

* * *

 

My neighbor spent a lot of time that week either walking to or from the park or sitting on his front porch, typing. A few times he would leave his laptop on a table he had dragged next to his chair and go lay in the grass, watching the sky. I still didn’t know what he was working on, but I honestly didn’t care enough to go introduce myself just so I could find out.

I had just bought myself a small mint plant that Saturday and was working on placing it near the tree in the far corner of my yard when I heard the typing sounds stop. I didn’t stop working, since that usually meant he was getting ready to go lay on his lawn, and once he did I wouldn’t be able to see him anyways.

I worked diligently digging that little hole, making sure it was big enough to fit the plant once I crushed up the soil it had been grown in along with the dirt I had been moving. When I finished, I set aside the trowel and was just about to pick up the plant in its plastic bucket-of-a-pot when I heard the sound of aluminum being crushed. I froze momentarily before sitting up and looking over at my neighbor. Yet again he was staring at me, this time with one hand frozen halfway to his head, like he had been about to run his hand through his hair.

I stood, clapping the dirt from my hands. I walked to the fence separating our properties and slipped into the space between two of my bushes, the same bushes I caught him staring at me from earlier that week. My eyes were narrowed, and I was pretty sure that my face had fallen into its usual angry expression. The guy looked scared, almost, as I crossed my arms. He dropped his hand into his lap and seemed to wait for me to yell at him.

However, I wasn’t angry. I was curious and confused.

After a while of making him wait, I finally spoke up.

“This is the second time I’ve caught you staring. So what’s up? It’s getting kinda creepy now,” I said. The guy opened and shut his mouth like a fish, succeeding in making himself look stupid.

“I, uh… Well, I’ve always admired the effort you put into your garden, and I guess I just space out while I look at it?” he replied. Ah, the question tone. He wasn’t telling me the truth, if not the whole truth. He looked like he wished he could rewind time and fix that so it came out normally.

I looked at him for a few moments, inspecting him with raised eyebrows. I sighed after a while, placing one hand on my hip and running the other through my hair. “You do realize that most other people would have been a lot more creeped out by that than I was, right?” I asked him. He visibly relaxed as I spoke, as if he had still been expecting me to yell or something. He nodded.

“I’m so sorry about that. I’ll try not to do it any more, I promise.”

“See that you don’t.” I paused. That was when I remembered I didn’t know his name. Had I ever known his name? “What’s your name again?”

“It’s Marco. I don’t think I ever told you. This is the most we’ve ever spoken,” he replied. I nodded, making sure to remember that.

_Well, I guess that explains why I couldn’t remember his name._

“I’m Jean. Nice to meet you, I guess.”

“Nice to meet you too, Jean.”

I liked the way he said it. He pronounced it correctly, instead of some of the stupid ways other people pronounced it. I mean, yeah, he had heard me say it, but still. It sounded right, almost, when he said it.

He began gathering up his stuff. “I guess I’ll talk to you later…?”

“Yeah…”

I turned around and began walking back to the mint plant when I paused. I wanted to know exactly _why_ he had been staring at me. I mean, I had a right to know, didn’t I? I turned back around and called Marco’s name. I liked the way it felt coming off my tongue. I know I probably sounded like some teenage girl, but I really did.

“What’s up?” he called. He had almost been to his door.

“I’m expecting the full reason why you keep staring at me eventually,” I said. With that, I turned and went the rest of the way back to my plant. I was back on my knees and settling the plant into its hole before I began to question what I just did.

_Do I really want to know some guy who was practically stalking me? I mean, I know he really wasn’t, but I caught him staring twice. Did I just dig myself into a hole?_


	2. Budding

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean accidentally wakes up Marco and later invites him to a party.

Six forty-five in the morning, and I was already up and about. I was in the middle of finishing my cup of coffee, and I was watching the sunrise color the cover of clouds from my back porch. It was peaceful, and as far as I could tell no one else in the nearby houses were up. When I finished my coffee, I went inside to put it in the sink. My clock said it was 6:59. The TV was playing a weather forecast that predicted high possibilities of a storm later in the day. I clicked the TV off.

I went outside to begin checking on how my plants had fared overnight only to find one of the most horrifying sights I had ever seen: Connie Springer and Sasha Braus, standing right smack in the middle of my forget-me-nots. My mouth dropped open, and I shook my head to try to make the image go away. However, I wasn’t dreaming, and they really were crushing my flowers.

“GODDAMMIT YOU TWO!” I screamed. Their heads whipped toward me.

“Can it, Jean, there’re kids in the area!” Connie retorted. I tugged on my bangs as I walked over to them, trying not to completely blow my top.

“Okay, fine, I’m cool. But can you _please_ tell me _why exactly_ you’re standing in the middle of my forget-me-nots?”

The pair looked down at the ground, shifting their feet around in the process. _Oh, God, please don’t let there be any buds under there…_ They stepped out of the flowerbed, in the process revealing that they really had destroyed a few of my flowers in the process.

“Jean, seriously, who cares? They’re just flowers,” Sasha said around her mouthful of bagel. I whipped my gaze up to her, glaring daggers.

“They’re _my_ flowers that I spent _all day yesterday_ planting. And you guys just killed a good portion of the buds!”

“Dude, calm down. I can’t believe you’re getting this mad about a few flowers. You can always just go buy a few more,” Connie replied, laughing.

“This was all that the nursery had left!”

_You don’t understand. Just shut up._

“There’re other places that sell these things, aren’t there?” Sasha added.

“Yes, but that’s not my point!” _Shut up._

“Then what is your point? Seriously, Jean. I think you’re too attached to your garden,” Connie retorted.

_JUST FUCKING SHUT UP!_

At that moment, a window slid open, and Marco poked his head out of said window. “Hey,” he said sleepily, rubbing grit out of his eyes and leaning on the sill. His hair poked up every which-way, and I noticed he wasn’t wearing a shirt.

“I don’t know what in the world you guys are arguing about, but that was a pretty rude seven AM awakening. I was up until two last night, you know,” Marco said. As he spoke, his voice grew thicker, and he ended his speech with a wide yawn he couldn’t quite hide behind his hand.

“Sorry about that, Marco. These two little shits decided it would be a great idea to trample my forget-me-not buds,” I replied, turning to glare at them. Sasha flipped me the bird behind her back as she inspected Marco intently, chewing on another bite of bagel.

“Hey, in our defense, they’re tiny and hard to see!” Connie said.

Right then, Sasha choked on her bite of bagel and began beating on her chest. Connie placed a hand on her shoulder, making sure she was alright. When she was finished beating her chest like some monkey, Sasha pointed at Marco.

“Jean, your neighbor’s _naked!_ ” she shouted.

Marco hit his head on the window frame, letting out a tiny little “ow” and reaching up to rub where he had hit afterwards. Connie choked on the air he was breathing, and my eyes widened as I felt myself jerk into straighter posture. Once Marco had composed himself, however, he became as gentlemanly as he could be while half-asleep and hanging half-naked out a window.

“Excuse me, ma’am, but I happen to not wear a shirt when I sleep. I’ve got sweats on, see?” he said, tugging on the waistband for emphasis. Sasha nodded slowly and took another bite of her bagel. An awkward silence fell over us for a few moments.

“Well… If you guys can be a little quieter, I think I’m going back to bed…” Marco said as he pointed behind himself. With that, he pulled himself back inside, shut and locked the window, and walked out of sight. Connie turned to me.

“Dude, you know him?”

“Uh, yeah, he _is_ my neighbor.”

“No, no, I mean by name!”

“I thought he didn’t interact with anyone! How did you get to know him?”

I thought back on the true circumstances and decided not to embarrass him. “He saw me in my yard a little while back and asked me about my garden,” I answered. It wasn’t _entirely_ a lie, at the very least, even if it wasn’t the entire truth.

“Aw, he’s some sorta pansy too? But holy shit, dude, I never would have thought _you_ of all people would be the one he opened up to first! Armin, sure, since they’re so alike, but _you?_ Damn!”

“I’m not _that_ unapproachable!”

“Uh, yeah, you are. You scare like half the kids in the neighborhood when they walk by to look at your flowers!”

I huffed and crossed my arms. “Okay. Go on then. Leave. You’ve said what you wanted to, so go.”

“But I wanted to as you something!”

“Too late. Go on. Get,” I said, shooing the two out of the yard. I slammed the gate behind them to prove my point of being done talking to them and turned back to my forget-me-nots. Thanks to them, I would have to spend even more time on settling them in their bed.

* * *

 

I spent a couple hours rearranging buds and re-spreading mulch. Normally I didn’t mind doing that, but because this was extra work forced on me due to Connie and Sasha’s stupidity, I hated it. I couldn’t even save a few of the buds. I was pretty sure I spent a lot of that time working muttering angrily about the whole situation.

I went inside and washed my hands when I finished, shrugging on a jacket afterward. Just as I sat back down under my red maple, I heard Marco walk down the steps to his porch. When I realized he was coming this way, I stood and left my yard, easily falling into step beside him despite being shorter than him.

“Hey, Marco, sorry about earlier. Those pieces of shit just-!”

“Trampled your flowers, I know,” Marco supplied. “Did you manage to save him?”

I looked over at Marco, beginning to see him in a new light. Most people wouldn’t care about a few flowers. He didn’t even know how glad I was to have been asked that. He didn’t know why I had turned to gardening, or why my forget-me-nots were so important to me. He had just asked.

“Most of them, yeah. But some weren’t so lucky.” I turned my head away and began muttering. “Fucking Connie and Sasha. They don’t even know. They didn’t care. They’re gonna have one coming to them, that’s for sure.”

“Oh. Sorry about that.”

I looked up and waved a hand, dismissing it. “Not your fault. Still, I’m sorry about that. Connie and Sasha just… They don’t always pay attention to their surroundings. And I don’t have the best temper.”

“I noticed when your shouting woke me up at seven in the morning. And don’t worry about it, I was able to get back to sleep anyways,” Marco replied. Neither of us spoke for a moment. “Were you planning on coming with me to get coffee, or did you just start walking with me to apologize for the shouting?”

“Oh! Oh, uh, I guess I can go with you?” I didn’t have any reason not to. I began digging in my pockets when I realized I didn’t have my wallet. I never carried loose change, so without my wallet I had nothing to my name. My eyes shut as I fought to suppress my annoyance at myself. “Money. That would be a good thing to have if I was going to go get coffee with you.”

I began to turn away, but Marco stopped me by grabbing the sleeve of my jacket. I don’t think he even realized he had done it, because he dropped his hand again as soon as I looked back at him and didn’t react otherwise.

“I’ve got enough for us both to get some. You can just pay me back later or something,” he offered.

I just stared at him, caught by surprise. “You sure, man?”

“Yeah, sure. And besides, I feel like I should let you get to know me some since you’ve caught me staring twice,” he replied, shrugging.

I searched his face with narrow eyes. _Is this some kind of joke?_ When I determined it wasn’t, I answered. “Alright, then…”

It was awkwardly quiet on the way to the shop Marco was headed to. I couldn’t think of anything to say that wasn’t some intrusive question. The next time I spoke was to order my coffee. Once we were on a bench in the park, not too far from the public garden, I felt more comfortable. As soon as I sat down, I slouched in the chair and balanced my coffee on my stomach, holding it in place between my hands.

Still, neither of us spoke or even looked at each other.

“So…” I began, unsure of what to talk about.

“So… Who were those people at your place this morning?” Marco asked.

_Thank you, Marco, for being more talkative than I am. I don’t know if you realized it, but you just saved us from a particularly awkward however-long-this-is-going-to-take silence._

“Oh, them? Connie Springer and Sasha Braus. Sasha was the girl eating a bagel, the one who thought you were naked. Connie was the short one.”

“They’re quite characters, aren’t they?”

I snorted. “Yeah. ‘Characters.’ They’re characters, alright. Now that they kind of know you and know that I know you exist, don’t be surprised if they try dragging you along into things when they drag me into their plans,” I replied. I noticed Marco look over at me out of the corner of my eye. He sipped his coffee before speaking.

“Well, I guess it would do me good to get out of the house once in a while.”

I looked at him, inspecting him. Marco’s hair looked better than it had earlier, almost fluffy. _Does he use conditioner or something?_ He was wearing jeans and Converse, and I couldn’t see his shirt. He had on a black hoodie under a leather jacket, hiding it from me. I looked up and noticed a scar on his earlobe. _Did this guy have an earring at one point? I guess I could ask him later. It’s not really important right now._

“Yeah, I’ve noticed you don’t go out much. What is it you do in there all the time, anyways? The same thing you do on your porch in the afternoons?” I asked.

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s what I do.”

_That totally tells me everything I wanted to know. Thank you so much._

“You work from home or something? A couple of times I’ve looked out a window pretty late at night and I’ll see you through one of your windows typing away at whatever it is. You always seem to forget to close your blinds when you do that,” I said.

“Yeah, I work from home… Do I really forget to close my blinds when I stay up late?”

“Yeah. I mean, it’s not like I use binoculars to see what you’re doing in there, but it’s kind of hard to ignore a light in what would otherwise be a view of a dark side of a house.”

Marco looked up at me and then back at his lap. He mumbled something I couldn’t hear.

“What was that?”

“Oh, nothing. Talking to myself.”

Another silence. It wasn’t as awkward this time, but I still didn’t want there to be silence. I liked talking to Marco.

“So what is it you do?” Marco asked, yet again being the one to break the silence.

“Landscaping.”

“Really? Well, I guess that makes sense. You _do_ spend a lot of time in your garden. Which is really pretty, by the way.”

I didn’t know what to say. How does somebody say “that means a lot to me, thanks” without it coming off weird? I didn’t look at Marco, only smiled. I hoped that if he noticed he would realize I was saying thanks in my own way. But I couldn’t let the conversation die again.

“Thanks.” Another pause as I thought about something to say. “Some of the other yards around the neighborhood are my work too.”

Marco was obviously curious after I said that. “Can you tell me which ones, or is there some sort of customer privacy thing you have going on?”

“Nah, I can tell you a few. Connie and Sasha are two. They have that house with the orange tree in the front. Then that one house with those three red maples and the creeping ivy going up the side of the house is another I did. That belongs to those two girls, Ymir and Krista. And then there’s that house with the river rock bed and the rose bushes under the windows. That’s where the attached-at-the-hips trio, Reiner, Bertolt, and Annie, live. That’s just to name a few.”

Marco nodded, and yet again silence fell on us. I really hated the silences, but I couldn’t for the life of me think of something to talk about. I stared up at the sky, looking for something to talk about. Instead, I found something unsettling. The cloud cover was getting heavier and darker. I had to get back to my plants. I stood, keeping my gaze on the sky.

“We should probably head back. It looks like it’s going to rain soon,” I said.

Marco stood and put one hand in his pocket. “Sure.”

We headed back toward our houses. I couldn’t take the silence anymore, so I hoped Marco wouldn’t mind a somewhat-intrusive question.

“Can I ask what it is you do on your computer all the time?”

I watched Marco stiffen. _Shit, I probably shouldn’t have asked that. But I am curious…_ After a while, I sighed and looked down at my cup. I noticed little dents forming in the paper cup, so I loosened my grip. I hadn’t even realized I had been white-knuckling it. I moved a hand away and popped up the collar of my jacket, trying to keep the wind off my neck. My hand dropped when I was done.

“Okay, I guess I can understand why you don’t want to tell me. But I really do expect to be told someday if it has to do with why you were staring at me,” I said.

“Okay. That’s understandable. I’ll… I’ll tell you eventually, but I can’t right now.”

I narrowed my eyes and looked at him. Why _couldn’t_ he? I was about to ask why when the rain began. Marco jumped when he felt the first raindrop.

“Shit! I dunno about you, Marco, but I gotta get home. I need to watch over my plants, make sure they don’t get washed away.”

I didn’t give Marco time to reply before I began running toward my house. Worry overtook me when I remembered that my forget-me-nots were sitting in loose soil. I could hear Marco behind me, but I was too worried to see if he was planning on following me. I busted through my gate and tore into my house, slamming down the cup. A few moments later, I had my covers and rope and busted through my front door again, heading right for my mint. Just as I did, Marco jogged over, hood up and cup nowhere in sight.

“Hey, Jean, you want some help?” he asked as he entered the yard. I looked up and squinted through the rain at him.

“That would be great, if you don’t mind risking getting muddy,” I replied as I tossed him some covers and rope.

“Alright, well, you’ve gotta tell me what ones I have to cover and how to do it because I don’t know much about plants.”

“That’s fine. Another pair of hands is always welcome, even if you aren’t sure what you’re doing.”

About half an hour, we finished. Everything was safely covered, and I didn’t feel like I was about to have a heart attack any more. I invited Marco to sit with me as thanks for helping. While he settled into one of the lawn chairs, I went inside and made some Belgian hot chocolate for the both of us. I make good fucking hot chocolate, so I wanted to offer it to him. Once it was all ready, I topped it with a generous amount of whipped cream and stuck spoons in each mug.

“I didn’t know if you liked whipped cream on your hot chocolate, but I put some on anyways. If you don’t want it I can take it, but it’s pretty good mixed in,” I said as I handed him one of the mugs.

“Thanks, Jean. Here, you should take half of it. This is a bit much for me,” he replied as I sat in the other chair.

I pulled my spoon out and licked it clean before reaching over and scooping some into my mouth. Once I had taken enough I turned to my own whipped cream and began making a dent in it. I heard little clinks, letting me know Marco was mixing in the rest of his. _Good, he took my suggestion. That makes it better._

“Did you make this stuff from real chocolate?” he asked a little while later. I pulled my spoon out of my mouth to answer.

“Huh? Oh, yeah. Someone really important to me used to make it for me like this, and when I left my hometown they taught me how to make it. It’s really the only thing I know how to make from scratch,” I replied before going back at it.

“Huh…”

When I finished my whipped cream, I looked up to notice Marco staring at me again. I had no idea how long he’d been doing it, but I was beginning to not care anymore.

“What? Do I have something on my face?”

“Yeah, actually, right here,” Marco replied, wiping at the corner of his mouth.

“Thanks, man.” I licked it away and began sucking down my drink, noting that as usual it had turned out well. My phone buzzed in my pocket. I took it out to see I had received a text from Connie.

**From: Connie**

**dude me and sasha are gonna have a party tomorrow. u should ask ur neighbor to come**

I let my thumb hover over the screen. Would Marco actually want to go? He didn’t seem much like the type to enjoy parties.

“Connie and Sasha are having a party tomorrow. Want to come with?” I asked. I didn’t get a response. I looked over and found Marco spacing out as he stared into my garden.

“Hello? Marco? Anyone home in there?” I asked, waving a hand by his face. He jumped.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry.”

“Then what did I ask you?”

“I don’t know. Sorry, I was lost in thought.”

I sighed, but I wasn’t really annoyed. It was kind of endearing for someone to get lost in thought so easily. I didn’t know what, but there was something about people like that that just made me want to like them.

“Jesus, Marco, you gotta notice when people are talking to you. I was asking if you wanted to come to this party Connie and Sasha are having. They just texted me about it and told me to ask if you wanted to come,” I said, holding out my phone for him to see.

My phone buzzed again. Marco smiled at the new message. “What?” I turned my phone back to myself.

**From: Connie**

**everyones coming so try to convince him i have 20 bucks on him actually being social for once**

“Oh, ha ha, very funny, Connie. Making a bet on the guy and you don’t even know him.” I began to reply to him, saying neither of us were going, when Marco stopped me.

“Before you say no for me in advance, let me say I’m willing to go. But I’m not going to know anyone. He’s right, I’m really not that social.”

I looked at Marco. “You’re sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure. But considering you’re the only person in the neighborhood I know, I’ll probably be sticking close to you. Hope you don’t mind.”

“Nope.” Actually, I was glad. I wasn’t necessarily a big fan of those parties. I erased what I had written and began a new message.

**To: Connie**

**yeah okay ill go and so will he**

Hardly a minute later, I heard Connie shouting in happiness from his house down the street. Moments after that my phone buzzed again. I shook my head.

**From: Connie**

**FUCK YEAH 20 BUCKS**

“Connie’s definitely happy.” I put my phone down and looked at Marco. “Hey, I should probably get your number if you’re really going to do this. Because if I were you, I wouldn’t give Connie your number right away, so I’ll be the middleman.”

Connie was known for accidentally sending mass texts, and I wanted to save Marco from the trauma for at least a little while.

“Oh, sure.” While Marco reeled off the numbers, I set up a new contact and quickly sent him a text. After I finished, I put my phone down again.

**To: Marco**

**hey its jean**

“You should have a text in a minute.”

Marco’s phone dinged in his jacket pocket. He pulled it out and tapped on the screen a few times before apparently responding. Must have been a habit. I fought the urge to smile.

**From: Marco**

**Got it. Thanks.**

I didn’t check my phone when it went off again. Marco finished off the last of his hot chocolate and stood. I looked up at him as he stretched momentarily. “Alright, well, I should probably be going. Thanks for the hot chocolate.”

“Thanks for helping me out,” I replied.

Marco handed me his mug. He walked off my porch and headed toward his house, throwing his hood up against the rain in the process. I sat there for a moment, watching the rain, before finishing off the last of my own hot chocolate. I brought in the cups and shed my jacket, hanging it above a space heater to dry it off, before going toward my bedroom. I stood in the doorway and looked through the window, toward what I guessed was Marco’s office.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This one came pretty easily to me once I actually got started ahaha;;  
> And it's so long, it's almost 4000 words. I usually only write about 2000!
> 
> Anyways. I'll be working on the drawings of their outfits from chapter two throughout the week.  
> Oh, and I also made a tumblr separate to connect to here, under the URL detectiveknights. (I'll be connecting my main, but I just wanted a separate so I don't get confused ahaha;; This came purely out of not understanding Ao3's messaging system.) I'm in the middle of making it, but by the end of the week it should be all done excluding the icon which I'll be drawing myself. You guys are more than welcome to check it out!
> 
> As always, love you guys!


	3. Extension

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jean becomes a tour guide for a night.

The morning of Connie’s thing, I almost texted Marco to ask if he was really sure he wanted to do this. A party probably wasn’t the best way to ease someone back into being a social human being, but he seemed to have his heart set on going (or at least, he did from my perspective). I was sitting on my back porch, looking at my bloom-less peppermint twist plants and balancing my phone on my knee, when my phone went off and slid off my leg onto the porch.

“Shit!” I dove for the phone, hoping it wasn’t damaged. I couldn’t afford replacing it just yet, and for some stupid reason I had taken off the protective case I usually had on it and couldn’t remember where I had put it. The phone was thankfully undamaged, so I checked the messages to find one from Marco and one from Connie.

**From: Connie**

**dude im so happy u got ur neighbor to come this is gonna b awesum**

**From: Marco**

**Hey, what sort of stuff should I expect for the thing today?**

I was in the process of deleting Connie’s text – I didn’t know why he had even texted me that because I was already aware of how excited he was – when my phone went off again with another text from Marco.

**From: Marco**

**Also what time should I be ready?**

I thought back to the last party at Connie and Sasha’s place. It had pretty much been a tame version of college parties in movies, for lack of a better way to put it.

**To: Marco**

**picture a basic college party. make people older and no one doing illegal drugs. thts about it. its at like 4 but it always starts sooner**

**From: Marco**

**Okay, thanks. I’ll be at your place at around 3 then. I’d like to get there early and ease into it some.**

**To: Marco**

**fuck i forgot you probably haven’t been to any parties since u were in school. yeah thts fine**

**From: Marco**

**Great. See you then.**

I looked down at myself after putting my phone back down and decided that one of the stupid duo’s parties didn’t deserve anything more than the mud-stained jeans and plain shirt I was already wearing. While I was watering my plants, Marco texted me once more, saying he was nervous and didn’t know what would be appropriate. I told him that he could show up in his birthday suit and no one would really care aside from “oh, that one neighbor who never leaves his house decided to show up naked” and then move on, but he still seemed nervous. I shrugged it off and decided that he would probably survive and, if needed, I could pull him outside.

I sat on the porch and waited for Marco for the rest of the time, bored out of my mind. When I finally saw him approaching my gate, I realized that he must have gone way into the back of his closet for what he was wearing. He had on a My Chemical Romance shirt. I had to bite back an obnoxious bark of laughter when I realized he had matched his button-up to the red in the pattern. I didn’t really have any place to judge, since I was wearing mud stained clothes.

Once we were on our way, I realized that Jaeger would probably be there. I grimaced right as Marco looked over.

“Do you not like parties?” he asked.

“I don’t mind them, but there’s this one guy I can’t stand who’s bound to be there. ‘M not looking forward to seeing the dick,” I replied. My answer seemed to catch Marco off guard.

“He can’t be all bad…?”

I snorted. “You haven’t met the dude.”

“Okay, I guess that’s true, but still…”

I hadn’t even realized that the music was so loud you could hear it down the street until I saw Marco cringing as we were two houses down. Knowing him, he was probably anticipating the worst and also hoping no one nearby had kids that had to go to school the next day. My hand twitched in my pants pocket; I had considered reaching up to pat his shoulder or something, but I still wasn’t entirely sure of his position on being touched (which was definitely the only reason).

I noticed Marco hesitate for a split second before following me up to the door. _You go, Marco. You’re a lot braver than I would be in your situation._

We let ourselves in, and I paused to try to figure out where they had put the food this time. Marco seemed simultaneously amazed and scared. I wasn’t really surprised, but now that he was actually there, I felt bad for getting him dragged into this mess.

“Yo, Jean!” Connie shouted, weaving his way through the crowd. He was splashing his drink everywhere, but I doubted he’d really care in the long run so long as he didn’t get ants that would eventually find their way to Sasha’s food. Connie stepped in front of us and eyeballed Marco, who looked extremely nervous.

“Sasha!” he called, keeping his gaze on Marco.

“Yeah?” Sasha appeared momentarily behind Connie and threw her arm around Connie’s neck. She was holding a plate of potato chips in that hand and mechanically brought another to her mouth every few seconds while she stared at Marco.

“Oh! It’s you! I’m glad you – Wait, no I’m not, now I owe Connie twenty bucks! Shit!” she said, somehow managing to keep all her food in her mouth. Connie laughed, so she switched the plate to her other hand and slapped him on the back of the head with her now-free hand before switching the plate back. “Well, either way, it’s good to see you out of your cave. I’m Sasha.”

“Um, I’m Marco. Nice to meet you…”

I glanced at Marco out of the corner of my eye and noticed how uncomfortable he looked. This was definitely not the best way for him to get used to people again. He looked like something was bothering him, too.

“Well, Marco, glad you could make it! Make yourself at home! I’m Connie, by the way. Oh, wait, I should probably introduce you to everyone,” Connie began.

“I got it, guys, go have fun,” I cut in.

Connie shrugged and walked away, tugging Sasha along by the arm still slung around his neck. _At least I saved him from being led around by them the entire time._

“You think they’d mind if I raided the fridge? The stuff that’s usually put out at parties doesn’t always appeal to me, and I kind of have a headache…” Marco said. I turned to see him holding the side of his head.

“Huh? Oh, no, I don’t think so. Well, Sasha might, but she’ll never figure out who it was if she cares. They might have some popsicles or something,” I replied.

I led the way to the kitchen and opened up the freezer, looking for some sort of popsicle or something. After a bit of looking, I found a bag full of red popsicles. They looked good, but I didn’t want to risk Sasha’s wrath more than I already was by stealing one for Marco. I handed it to Marco and headed toward the cooler under the island counter, looking for beer. (The free beer was one of the only reasons I came without complaining much. I did like a few of the people here, but not enough of them to want to spend hours flailing around to some bad bubblegum pop songs or something.) I cracked it open and turned back to Marco, taking a sip.

“Okay, so, you want to finish that first before I go introduce you to people?” I asked. Marco pulled the popsicle out of his mouth.

“Yeah, that’d be best. I’m not going to remember much if I meet all these people with a headache.” As soon as he finished, he went back to sucking on the popsicle.

We sat in silence, trying to ignore how loud the music from the other room was. Armin walked through the door right as Marco finished the last bit of his popsicle. He paused when he saw Marco, but quickly recovered and turned to me.

“Hey, Jean, who’s this?” he asked.

Armin had to be one of the nicest guys I’d ever met. And the smartest. And the most courageous during times of stress. The dude was going through medical school, and I once saw him stand up to guys like three times his size in high school so they’d leave him, along with Jaeger and his adopted sister Mikasa, alone. I hadn’t been close enough to help or hear what had gone on, but just as I was about to go over and help them, the big guys stood down. Armin was a pretty badass guy when he wanted to be.

“Oh, this is Marco. He’s my neighbor,” I replied. I swiveled on the stool to look at Marco. “Marco, this is Armin.”

Marco stood and walked over to where Armin was standing on the other side of the island, tossing the pink-stained stick into a bag of trash I hadn’t even noticed on the way. They shook hands, and Armin seemed to take to him, because I noticed him smile up at Marco. As usual, Marco was grinning.

“Nice to meet you, Armin.”

“Likewise. Hey, if you don’t mind me saying, you seem kind of uncomfortable. Is something wrong?” Armin asked. Marco ran a hand through his hair.

“No, not really. I’m not used to being around so many people. It’s been a while since I’ve been to a party like this,” Marco replied. Armin smiled at him.

“Yeah, you don’t seem like the kind of person to come to parties much. Well, this is about as bad as it gets,” Armin explained, waving a hand through the air.

“Nice to know. Thanks.”

I straightened my posture on the stool and stood, pulling my free hand out of my pocket. Marco glanced at me when I walked up beside him.

“You feeling better now?” I asked. I reached up with my free hand and tapped Marco’s temple.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

I noticed Armin’s gaze flash over to me. His eyes betrayed his worry, but I gave him a look that hopefully said it was nothing. He looked back at Marco and smiled.

“Okay, then I’d better go introduce you to some other people. We’ll see you later, Armin,” I said. I led Marco out, going slowly because I knew he would turn and wave goodbye like the dweeb he was.

“Nice to meet you, Armin!” Marco called as the kitchen door swung shut behind us. Armin said something, but I didn’t hear it. I doubted Marco had been able to hear it.

I led Marco around the building, introducing him to people. He tended to answer with some pretty basic responses, which led me to assume that his headache was coming back and that he probably wouldn’t remember most of the people I was introducing him to. I kept at it, though, hoping at least a few names would worm their way into his memory for the next time he was dragged into something like this. I told him that they wouldn’t likely forget him now, and that he should expect more invitations to stuff from now on.

When it came to Jaeger, I didn’t approach him. Sasha was weird about fights in her house, and there were some pretty nasty rumors about what she made the last two people who fought in her house do. Instead, I pointed him out to Marco from a safe distance, on the complete other side of the room and with the crowd separating us. Thankfully, even with these obstructions, it wasn’t hard to pick him out if you found a break in the crowd: Jaeger was flailing around drunkenly beside Connie to some song that was (what I assumed was) an old Lady Gaga song.

We ran into Armin again, this time while we were exploring Connie’s movie collection. Marco gave him his number and told him to just text him later so he’d have his. To be completely honest, Armin was the only person of the entire group of people here I approved of Marco giving his number to right away. The others were a bit harder to get the hang of, and when you didn’t know them that well that didn’t always mean a good thing.

After that, I raided the cooler in the kitchen for more beer and pulled Marco onto the back porch with me. Once I had unloaded onto the porch table, I slumped into a chair and drew a can closer to me. I pointed Marco to the other chair and slid another can across the table to him, opening my own after he had his. I rested my head on the back of the chair, looking out over Connie and Sasha’s back yard and balancing my can on my leg, sighing. _Their back yard looks like it needs more attention._

“I can’t stand being around that many people for that long. I’m just glad we managed to avoid Jaeger for the most part,” I said. I brought my head back up to take a drink of my beer before letting it fall on the chair back again.

“Yeah, it definitely takes the right kind of person to like these things,” Marco replied. He cracked open his beer and took a sip from it.

A while later, we were both considerably drunk. Marco had begun muttering to himself, probably trying to make himself remember names. I sat up and leaned on the table top, balancing my chin on it. I eyed him from that position. Marco’s skin was flushed, but it wasn’t that easy to tell, what with the dimming sunlight and his tanned complexion. He balanced his head in his hand and stared right back at me. Neither of us said a word.

Just as Marco took in a breath – for what I’m assuming was going to be something he wanted to tell me – the back door swung open. Armin stepped out and looked at each of us. He turned to Marco, which was probably a good idea. I was much more drunk than Marco seemed to be.

“Hey, Marco, we should probably get you home. Jean, too. You guys look pretty drunk,” Armin said.

Marco nodded and stood. He walked to my side and reached for my arm, missing once before grabbing hold of my wrist. He pulled me to my feet and balanced me before slinging my arm around his shoulders.

“Hey, Armin? Would ya mind leadin’ us to Jean’s place? It’s closer,” Marco said. I could tell by how light his slurring was that he wasn’t close to being as drunk as me. That was probably a good thing, though.

“Yeah, I can do that. C’mon.”

Armin led us to my house and through my garden. Through bleary vision obscured by watering eyes, my garden looked more like a runny watercolor painting than a physical thing I spent most of my time working on. It was weird. Marco dug in my pocket for my keys and, after fumbling with them for a moment, found the right one.

Armin bade us good night and left then, and he headed back to the party. Probably to make sure Jaeger didn’t freak out and break something. Once we were inside, Marco dragged me to my couch and threw me down onto it. He immediately melted onto the love seat. I rolled over into a somewhat-uncomfortable position to look at him.

“Jus’ stay here. Fer t’night. ‘Kay, Marco?” I said.

Without even waiting for an answer, I rolled back over and fell asleep, right then and there.

* * *

 

I woke up later than usual the next morning, at about 7:45. Marco had pulled his knees to his chest in his sleep, but his arms were straight along his sides. The one underneath him would probably be asleep when he woke up. As I watched, he moved so his head fell from the seat and was dangling from the edge of the chair. He had kicked the pillows of the chair, too.

I sat up and yawned, scratching my head and then my stomach. I stumbled toward the kitchen and pulled open the fridge, trying to decide on what to have for breakfast. It would have to be something Marco would eat, but what exactly that was, I didn’t know. After a while of thinking, I decided on just making scrambled eggs.

I shuffled around the kitchen and pulled out the things I would need. Butter, four eggs, pepper, milk, a butter knife, a fork, a bowl, a pan… I cracked the eggs into the bowl and began whisking them, yawning as I did. Usually I put in pepper as I did this, but I didn’t know if Marco liked pepper in his eggs. I paused to pour a dash of milk into the bowl before I finished the whisking.

I set the bowl aside and heated up the pan, using a slab of butter to grease the pan. Right after I poured the egg mix into the pan, Marco shuffled into the kitchen. I stirred the eggs in the pan and turned right as he pulled a stool out at the counter. I saluted him with the fork.

“Morning, Sleeping Beauty,” I teased as I turned back to the stove and folded the eggs. It didn’t register with him.

“Do you not have a hangover?”

I shook my head. “Nah, I’m good. I hold my liquor pretty well. I’m assuming you are, too, since you aren’t complaining about noise or light or anything?”

“Yeah, I’m fine too.”

We didn’t say anything for a few moments. I looked at the pepper again before glancing back at Marco. “Do you mind if I put pepper in the eggs?”

“No, go ahead.”

I added a couple dashes of pepper and refolded the eggs, stirring a little to break them up. When they were ready, I divided them into two parts and scooped them onto two plates. I gave one to Marco and slid a fork to him before going to sit beside him. I ate slowly, watching Marco methodically eat his breakfast. My gaze slid up to his ear, and I noticed the scar again.

“What’re you staring at? Do I have weird patterns pressed into my face or something?” Marco asked when he noticed me looking.

I shook my head. “No, that’s not it. I was trying to figure out if you had your ears pierced at one point.”

Marco set his fork down and reached up to touch his ears. “I thought the scars were mostly gone…” he mumbled.

“So you’re not denying it.”

His hands dropped, and he picked up the fork again. “Nah, not denying it. I had my ears pierced in high school. They were just some simple little rings, though.”

“You don’t seem to be the type for earrings. So what was it? A dare? Trying to be a rebel?” I asked. Marco laughed.

“Nah, I was what I guess you could call a ‘softcore punk’ or something along those lines. I was never brave enough to get any tattoos, but I did get my ears pierced.”

I looked down at his shirt, the red-and-white design jumping out against the black. “That from that time too?”

Marco nodded. “Yep. I haven’t worn this in years. This was one of my favorite bands back then. I might still have some of my CDs in a box somewhere.”

I inspected Marco for a moment, judging his sincerity. “That’s not as impressive as what I expected.”

Marco snorted. “Coming from the guy whose hands are permanently stained brown from gardening so much,” he retorted.

I honestly liked spending time with Marco. It had been a long time since I had been able to just throw around teasing words like that. With anyone, really. It was a nice change from just puttering around in my garden.

“So what is it you do with your time when you’re not in your garden?” Marco asked.

“Uh, nothing, really. There’s usually not much that catches my attention on TV, and I’m not too much of a reader. I guess I take walks,” I said. I stopped to think about it for a moment. “I’m kind of a boring person.”

“You’re saying that to the person who had been holed up in their house for ages.”

I laughed. “Yeah, I guess that’s true. You were like some sort of social recluse or something. Nothing like I assume you were like when you were a ‘punk’ back in high school,” I teased.

“What? It’s true! Why else would I have pierced my ears and have this shirt?”

I shrugged. There could be many reasons. “I dunno. Some people just do it for the heck of it.”

Idle chit-chat ensued for who knows how long. We finished our eggs, and then the subject switched around. A show I actually sometimes watched (it turned out I had missed the finale), some plant Marco had seen a picture of (it was in a picture from that one garden of only deadly plants), music taste (ours wasn’t very different), even the meaning of life (forty-two, Marco insisted, and he then explained something involving Japanese). It was… Nice.

At one point, Marco took out his phone and grimaced at it. “Wow, we’ve been talking for a really long time.”

“Really? What time is it?” I asked. I leaned over his shoulder and checked the time on Marco’s phone, too lazy to turn my head the other direction for the clock in my kitchen. It was already noon. “Shit, you’re right. I have to water my plants… Don’t really want to get up though…”

I pushed my plate away from myself and collapsed onto the counter. I didn’t care that I was acting like some spoiled brat asked to do chores. I genuinely didn’t want to get up. Because getting up most likely meant Marco would have to go, and I had realized how much I actually needed social interaction. And I liked being social with Marco. Marco stood and laughed, moving the plates into the sink.

“C’mon, Jean, I know you don’t want to let all your work go to waste. Besides, if everything died, I wouldn’t have a pretty garden to look at any more,” Marco said. He pulled on my arm, the way a shy child pulled on someone’s arm if they wanted attention without speaking.

“Alright, alright. I’ll go work on it.”

Marco grinned when I said that. _Maybe he DOES take happy pills or something. I can honestly say I have never met another human being as happy as he is all the time._

Marco headed toward the gate after following me outside, waving. “Alright then, Jean. I guess I should probably get going. Thanks for letting me stay at your place last night.”

I waved before turning to my hose. Before I got to work, though, I pulled out my phone and composed a message to Marco. I could have just outright told him, since he was barely outside my yard, but I guess I liked being able to just contact him whenever I wanted. (To be honest, I don’t know why I _didn’t_ just call out to him.)

**To: Marco**

**hey today was pretty fun. we should do it again sometime**

Marco entered his house just as his phone went off. While I waited, I started filling up my aluminum watering can. Sometimes I just felt like using it, and that was one of those times. It took a while for Marco to respond, but after a few minutes he did.

**From: Marco**

**Yeah, it was fun. Just let me know if you want to hang out or something sometime. I’ve got a pretty good movie collection if you like those.**

**To: Marco**

**yeah that would be great. ill keep that in mind**

I shoved my phone in my pocket and got to watering, trying to decide if I should start thinking about new plants for when some of the older flowers died. I shook my head, deciding that when the time came, I’d think about it then. My near-peace was disturbed by my phone ringing. I had only had a few minutes. According to the caller ID, it was Connie.

“Hey, Connie, what’s up? You need something?” I said in place of a greeting.

“Hello to you too. Actually, no, I just wanted to say everyone was glad you and Marco made it. You haven’t been to any of the neighborhood parties in ages, and I know Marco hasn’t been to a party since he was in high school. I could see it,” Connie said. I glanced over at Marco’s place.

“Yeah, well, I guess I needed to see everyone.”

You could pick up my implied “not Jaeger, though” from a satellite.

“No, but seriously. It’s good for you to get out and talk to some real people instead of those flowers all the time. Like, I know your garden is basically your reason for living, but you can’t become like some dad or something. Next thing I know you’ll be growin’ some weird-ass mustache and going to Home Depot for wood so you can build yourself a deck or something,” Connie replied.

“Okay, yeah, I get it.”

I noticed Armin walking toward Marco’s place and acknowledged him with a smile. My hands were too full to wave. He smiled back but continued hurrying on to Marco’s place. He was let in almost instantly.

“You sure? Sure you aren’t secretly a dad or something?”

“Yes, Connie, I am the youngest Kirstein around.”

“Okay, man. Oh, before I forget, I wanted to ask you something. When did you get so close with Marco anyway?”

“I dunno. A week or so ago, I guess? He just caught me outside and asked about my garden. Then we ran into each other a couple times, and that’s that.”

I finished watering my plants and set the watering can down. I reached up and put a hand on the back of my neck, inspecting the growth of the roots of my red maple.

“Sure you’re not something more?”

_Way to dredge up memories of a time I’d rather forget, Connie._

“Yes, I’m sure.”

“Okay, whatever you say!” Connie replied in a sing-song voice.

“Just shut up, Connie. Was that all you needed?”

I looked up to see Armin passing by again. I waved when I caught his eye. He smiled and saluted me as he continued on his way back in the direction he had come.

“Yeah, I guess that was it. See you around, Jean.”

“Bye, Connie.”

I couldn’t believe him. He only just found out I knew the guy the day before, and I had literally just told him we hadn’t been talking for very long, and he already wanted to suggest things? And those suggestions were based on times I didn’t like to talk about and had only told him to get it off my chest. I mean, yeah, he hadn’t told anyone else, but Jesus, he didn’t need to tease me about it. I crossed my arms and kicked at the dirt.

But I really did like spending time with Marco. Nice, easygoing Marco.

Yeah, I could make friends with him.

What could hold me back?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, I'm sorry it took me so long to get this out. Shouldn't have, but it did. The weeks before spring break are always busy. As for spring break, now that it's over? I have no idea what I was doing.  
> Also, sorry it's taken so long to come out. It took me a little longer to write this one, and then for some reason Google Chrome wouldn't let me post this. I'm using Firefox right now and it's weird.
> 
> Their outfit drawings never came into existence, either. Probably should work on that.


End file.
